


The Lamp

by elaine



Category: The Sentinel
Genre: Alternate Universes, Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-10-20
Updated: 2002-10-20
Packaged: 2017-12-11 08:17:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/795929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elaine/pseuds/elaine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A silly piece of fluff about a cop, a lamp and a genie.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Lamp

**Author's Note:**

> Actually, i thought of making Jim a genie first, but it just wouldn't jell. otoh, i had no such problems with turning Blair into one. i guess that must mean something.

 

 

It was sitting on Jim's desk when he got back from the men's room. Small and badly tarnished and looking like something out of the Arabian Nights. Jim sat behind his desk, ignoring it, and the silence that had fallen when he'd entered the bullpen. As he knew they would, the others kept throwing glances in his direction and eventually somebody snickered. It caught on, bouncing from one desk to another until someone finally succumbed to the temptation to raise the stakes.

"Hey, Ellison. Aren't you gonna make a wish?" It was Brown, predictably enough. The genial clown of Major Crime. "We figured with your luck with women, you could use all the help you can get to find a date."

It definitely wasn't the time, Jim decided, to inform his fellow officers of the law that his love life was perfectly fine, thank you very much, it just didn't involve actual women. After six months of lusty, sweaty guy-sex, mostly one night stands, he still hadn't quite adjusted to the concept that his inclinations weren't nearly as conservative as he'd always imagined them to be.

Instead he smiled with a resigned patience he was far from feeling and threw it back at them. "Laugh it up, H. Didn't I see you hanging around Club Pigalle last Friday night? Hoping to get lucky were you?"

Easily distracted on a slow Wednesday afternoon, the others turned their attention to the disaster that was Brown's dating schedule and Jim was left in peace. He set the lamp on one side and opened the topmost file from a stack nearly a foot high with a sigh of resignation.

* * *

Why he took the lamp home with him Jim was never, afterwards, sure. Probably it was just to make sure nobody was reminded of why it had been put on his desk in the first place. He put it down on the little table just inside his door and forgot about it. For a while.

Every once in a while the dented, dirty object would catch his eye, but he had no possible use for it and it was so obviously fake, so tacky, that he really ought to just throw it out. Somehow, he never quite got around to it.

Then he met Andrew, and for a couple of weeks he would hardly have noticed if the entire loft had been redecorated in an Arabian Nights theme. He was far too distracted, awash in a sea of hormones, lust and - pathetically enough, as it turned out - complete infatuation. Unfortunately, three weeks after their first date, Andrew decided that he wasn't over his ex yet and _really_ needed just to be friends.

Caught between embarrassment that he could have been such a fucking idiot and complete and abject misery, Jim clenched his jaw, put his head down and worked like a maniac for two days before getting totally shit-faced and passing out on the couch on Friday evening. When he woke, the first thing he saw was the lamp.

If an inanimate object could be said to express emotion, then that lamp was certainly radiating an aura of smug condescension. The dull gleam of the few spots where the tarnish was less apparent had a sarcastic quality that was kind of startling, really. Jim groaned, rolled off the couch and staggered towards the bathroom. A long, satisfying piss and an even longer shower restored Jim to some semblance of sanity and he returned to the living area ready to convince himself that he'd imagined the whole thing.

The lamp was _sneering_ at him.

He retreated to the kitchen area and made himself some strong black coffee, glancing now and then at the lamp in the same way he always poked at a sore tooth with his tongue. Could a lamp be possessed? He finished his coffee without coming to any conclusion other than that he wasn't going to be mocked by some dented, corroded and generally crappy bit of junk shop kitsch. He'd show it who was boss. It was time to clean that hunk of scrap metal up.

He advanced on it with the metal polish in one hand and an old cleaning cloth in the other, half expecting it to fight back. Instead it fitted into his hands like it had been made exactly for that purpose. He dabbed the polish over its surface and then settled into a good, firm scrubbing action.

The explosion took him completely by surprise. One minute he was perched on the arm of the couch, the next he was on his ass on the floorboards, his legs sprawling and his elbow throbbing where it had hit the floor first. Jim coughed and blinked to clear the smoke from his eyes.

"Thou hast woken me from the Sleep of Ages and I must now serve Thee, Oh Most Beneficent Master." A young man, dressed in the most outrageous costume Jim had ever seen, swept a florid bow and then straightened. There was a scornful gleam in his eyes. "It is decreed by the Lord of Heaven that thou mayest... mayest... oh, crap..."

Completely unnerved, Jim snatched up his gun from the coffee table and fired. The young man scowled at him resentfully. "What the fuck was that?"

He'd fired at point blank range and aimed right at the centre of the intruder's chest, yet he still stood there looking startled and annoyed and not the slightest bit damaged. "I shot you." Jim pointed out the obvious. "With a gun," he added, completely unnecessarily.

"Oh?" The young man looked intrigued. He turned to survey the damage done to the wall behind him. "What does a gun do? Besides make a mess and a lot of noise? Is that meant to frighten your enemies away?"

He was still drunk, and probably still asleep. At least Jim hoped he was. He levered himself to his feet. "I'm going to bed."

* * *

There was a man sitting cross-legged on the end of his bed when Jim woke. For a moment he just lay there and stared, wondering why he'd picked up some guy who looked like an extra from a 'Sixties sitcom. Or... had that been a woman? Jim ran a fuzzy tongue around his mouth and immediately regretted it. A hangover _and_ a hallucination - everything he needed to make his day absolutely fucking perfect.

"So, Aladdin. What's with the harem pants?" Jim pushed himself up onto his elbows and reached for the glass of water on his nightstand. Funny, he didn't remember putting that there.

The young man looked down at himself with a satisfied smile. "You like this colour on me? It's my favourite."

The pants were the colour of peacock feathers and looked like they were made of fine silk. A generous amount of fabric billowed out from a tightly fitting band, heavily embroidered in gold and purple and midnight blue, and was gathered in again at the ankles. All he wore with them was a tiny bolero-style vest that barely covered his nipples and exposed a solid chest luxuriously covered with dark whorls of hair. Above this ensemble, was the face of a Botticelli nobleman - long dark curls brushing his shoulders, olive complexion, with large blue eyes and sensual lips. The effect was only slightly spoiled by a noticeable five o'clock shadow and a slightly puggish nose.

"Yeah, looks great." Jim twisted onto his side, allowing his legs to drop over the edge of the bed. He'd forgotten he was naked, but couldn't help feeling pleased at the stranger's appreciative expression. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh. Well..." he struck a pose and cleared his throat. "Thou hast woken me..."

"Cut the crap, okay?" Jim interrupted the spiel with a glare. "I'm hungover and I've just broken up with my boyfriend, who, by the way, I wish I'd never fucking met..."

"Granted." There was something different about the voice. Something... powerful, something old...

Jim felt an odd, twisting sensation inside his head. "What the hell...? What have you done?"

"You made your first wish, master. You wished never to have met your boyfriend, so..." he shrugged. "It just takes a moment for the full effect."

He could feel it happening. Memories twisting and slipping until the last, faint recollection of meeting Andrew three weeks ago faded from his mind and all he could remember was making the wish that had started the whole process. It felt good. For a moment. Then he was outraged. "Don't you mess with my head again!"

"Is that your second wish, oh Enlightened One?" There was a definite smirk on his face.

"No!" Jim's response was instinctive. "It's a warning. _Don't_ fuck with me." It suddenly occurred to him that he had no idea what he'd landed in. It was time for a little light interrogation. "How many wishes do I get, anyway?"

The blue eyes widened. "Three, of course. Don't you know anything? How long have I been in that lamp anyway?"

Jim found a grim satisfaction at the prospect of shaking up his visitor's composure. "Guess that depends on when you went in there."

"The twelfth year of the reign of Neb-waseret-amun. He caught me with his favourite eunuch and had his Court Wizard turn me into a Djinn." He blinked. "That's a Genie, to you."

"Well, I have no idea who this guy was, but I'd guess it could be anything from a few hundred to a few thousand years."

"Wow!" The blue eyes widened. "No wonder everything looks so strange."

"Sinbad, you have no idea." Jim grinned. Judging by the angle of the light it was late afternoon. "Let me introduce you to popcorn, beer, and basketball."

* * *

If anyone had ever told Jim he'd spend a weekend entertaining a Genie, and what's more, enjoying it, he would probably have locked them in the detox tank for a few days. But the Genie, once he'd got over the shock that was modern culture, was surprisingly good company.

Sunday morning, Jim came down the stairs from his bedroom to find him sitting at the table, busily clicking the mouse of Jim's laptop. He looked up with a grin. "Hey, Jim. I found out how old I am. This internet thing is _great_. You can find all sorts of information on it."

"How did you find out about the internet?" Jim made his way to the coffee pot, already brimming with the best coffee he'd ever tasted at just the perfect temperature. It had been like that since yesterday. He poured himself a cup and wandered over to see what his uninvited guest was doing.

"There was this movie on last night." The Genie glanced up as Jim choked. "What's wrong, Jim?"

"You're surfing gay porn?" Jim thought desperately of his almost maxed out credit card. "Just how did you pay for access?"

"Oh, they just wanted me to type some numbers in, so I did." He smiled sunnily. "I saved the password for you."

"You did?" Jim clicked to the next picture. "Okay..." after a couple more pictures Jim remembered how the conversation had started. "So, how old are you?"

"Five thousand four hundred fifty-three. Give or take a few years. Pretty cool, huh?"

Jim blinked. "Five thous..."

"Deal with it, Jim. If I can cope, then you oughta be able to."

"You've got a point. What do you want for breakfast?" Jim headed back to the kitchen. His stomach was already making protesting noises.

"I'll get that. Why don't you have a shower?" The Genie smiled at Jim over the top of the laptop. "It's great. I spent _ages_ in there. You have no idea what it's like not to have a wash for over five thousand years."

"No, and I never want to." Jim scratched the back of his head. "I don't suppose you left me any hot water?"

The blue eyes stared back at him blandly. "You don't have to worry about that."

It was the best shower he'd ever had. Not only was the water hot, but it smelt faintly of sandalwood. Maybe not Jim's favourite scent, but perfectly liveable with. He towelled off with towels that felt softer and fluffier than he remembered and wandered back out to the kitchen in his bathrobe.

The table was covered with food - exotic fruits, plates piled with scrambled eggs and mushrooms and bacon and waffles and hash browns. Bagels and cream cheese and about a dozen bowls of preserves. Pitchers of various fruit juices, and, of course, coffee. More food than he could eat in a month. Far more food than his cupboards had ever held at any one time.

The genie looked pleased at his stunned expression. "I hope you're hungry."

* * *

So far, having his own, personal Genie was turning out to be a good thing, but Jim was a cautious man. In his experience nothing was so good that it couldn't all turn to disaster in a very short period of time. He needed to know what to expect.

"I get three wishes, right?"

"Well, you've already used one." The Genie flipped through a couple of channels and settled back to watch an old movie.

"And then what?"

"Then I go back into the lamp." An impatient glance silenced his next question. "I'm watching this. Do you mind?"

Jim grabbed the remote and hit the power button. "That's it? What's in it for you?"

"Nothing. It's punishment, remember?" The Genie pouted. He eyed the remote resentfully. "Can I have that back now?"

"So it wouldn't bother you if I took my time over the other two wishes?" After all, those two wishes could be very important. He had to think very carefully about what he was going to wish for. Besides, he was beginning to see the benefits of having a Genie around the loft. "There's no time limit or anything?"

"Nope. Knock yourself out." He made a grab for the remote and Jim surrendered it.

"Just one more thing. What's your name?"

"My name?" A reluctant glance. "You want to know my name?"

"Since we're gonna be spending some time together." Jim smiled winningly. "I can't keep calling you Ali Baba, now, can I?"

"I'd prefer it if you didn't." An incipient pout marred the line of the Genie's lower lip. "Oh, all right it's Blair."

Jim raised an eyebrow. "You know, I'm no expert on ancient history, but I'm pretty sure nobody was called Blair five thousand years ago."

"I saw this movie last night and I liked the name, okay?" The pout was in full bloom now. "It's a lot easier than my real name."

"Which is?"

The Genie sighed and let out a stream of guttural sounding syllables which could have been ancient curses for all Jim knew. "...happy now?"

"Okay, okay. Blair it is."

* * *

It hadn't really occurred to Jim that Blair might go with him on Monday morning, but there he was, in his peacock blue harem pants, sitting next to Jim's desk in Major Crime. Nobody seemed to notice. He didn't have much time to think about that, because a call came in almost immediately; a murder in Chiang Kai-Shek Park.

The dead man was a high level drug dealer, and the heat was on right from the start. Simon was there, barking orders and looking pissed. Nothing new there. Jim played it cool, inspected the body and talked to Forensics, all the time aware of the gaudily dressed Genie hovering at his back.

At first he thought people couldn't see Blair at all, until he thought he saw one of the uniformed officers acknowledge him with a slight nod. Then Rafe passed them in the hallway when they got back to Major Crime, looked straight at Blair, smiled and said a friendly 'hey'.

Blair acted as though it happened every day. "Hey, Rafe. How's it going?"

A non-committal wave of his hand as Rafe walked away from them was all the answer he gave, but it left Jim in no doubt that other people could see his companion. His companion who was swanning round Cascade in early Spring wearing a skimpy top and thin silk pants. With embroidery.

He caught Blair's eye and signalled him to go into one of the interview rooms. "They can _see_ you!"

"Well, yeah." Blair's tone indicated that Jim was stating the obvious.

"But, you... but, those... those _clothes_..." In a moment he was going to start stuttering, which he'd never done in his life before.

Blair smiled brilliantly. "Don't worry. They can't see them."

All sorts of images danced at the back of Jim's eyes, from a floating, disembodied Blair-head to naked-Blair. This was getting worse by the moment. "What _can_ they see?"

"Oh. Well that's kinda difficult." Blair's eyes developed a vague squint as his brow furrowed in concentration. "I mean, each person sees me differently. Kinda, they see what they expect to see."

"That doesn't make any sense." Jim resisted the urge to grab him by the shoulders and shake him. He'd tried to touch Blair once and not only had it been entirely unsuccessful, but he'd been left with a weird tingling sensation in his hands for several hours. "How can they expect _anything_? You're a Genie. Nobody in this day and age expects to see a damn Genie."

"Hey, I don't make the rules, all right?" Blair went on the defensive. "Besides, I'm new at this. I don't exactly have all the answers. I just know that... well, people see what they want to see. You want me to show you?"

"Okay." Jim crossed his arms over his chest. This was probably going to be a horrible mistake, but he needed to know what he was letting himself in for.

A strange shimmering effect surrounded the Genie for a moment and then Jim saw a perfectly ordinary young man - if you discounted the long hair and the pouty lips - wearing a pair of faded jeans and several layers of shirts under a nondescript corduroy jacket. He even had a pair of wire rimmed glasses perched on his nose. The kid looked no more peculiar than any 'Seventies-retro hippie student. Jim repressed a sigh of relief. "So, that's how people see you?"

"More or less." Blair's tone of polite disinterest didn't quite match the sparkle in his eyes. "I thought the glasses were a nice touch. Original."

It took a moment for Jim to realise the implications of that. "You mean _I_...?"

"Uh huh." Blair grinned. "Totally."

Shaking his head, Jim ushered Blair out into the hallway. "Wonder where _that_ came from..."

* * *

Jim hadn't had a partner for a long time. Mostly he liked it that way and, since he tended to rub most people the wrong way, Simon had allowed him to work alone. Still, he found he was enjoying having Blair tag along with him. He was even useful on occasion.

If only it wasn't for that Arabian Nights costume... Jim knew that only he could see it, but that was the problem. He _could_ see it, and he was finding it increasingly distracting. It was so... _blue_. And, he admitted to himself, it was incredibly sexy. It wasn't just the way the wide embroidered band fitted low across Blair's flat belly, or the way the little vest would move occasionally to reveal a dark, erect nipple surrounded by a whorl of dark hair. He could have dealt with that. At least, he thought he could have; but it was all rendered moot by one, crucial feature. Every time Blair moved, or a stray current of air touched him, the thin cloth would ripple and cling to his thighs and groin like a second skin; and it didn't take any great intelligence to deduce that he wasn't wearing anything underneath.

Once he'd noticed it, late on that first day, he couldn't ignore it. He found himself checking Blair out, or rather checking out his package, with increasing frequency. And a very nice - not to mention _hot_ \- package it was. If only he could _do_ something about it... He knew Blair had noticed, but the Genie said nothing. What was there to be said, anyway?

After three days of stewing in his own, increasingly lustful, juices, Jim's patience finally snapped. They'd closed a case that day and Blair was in a boisterous mood, bouncing in his seat as Jim drove them back to the loft. Singing along, slightly flat, to the music on the radio until Jim turned it off, and then trying with all the persistence of a playful puppy to find out what was bugging him. He kept it up all the way up the stairs and while he waited for Jim to unlock the door. Once the door was safely closed behind them, Jim let fly.

"What's bugging me?" He almost snarled. " _You_ are, damnit. You're a five thousand year old Genie. You shouldn't be using slang like that. It's not natural."

Blair stared at him open-mouthed. Unfortunately, it didn't last long. "Lighten _up_ , man. No need to get your panties in a bunch."

Something inside Jim snapped. "And speaking of panties... I wish you'd just lose the fucking outfit."

Oops. The moment the words left his mouth, Jim knew he'd made a terrible mistake. Blair pouted sulkily and said 'granted' in _that_ voice and was immediately standing in front of him balls-naked. Jim simply stared, unable to move. Forget the fevered imaginings and wet dreams, the reality was far better.

"Happy now?"

Jim shook his head wearily. "Not hardly. I'm sorry, okay?"

Blair hunched a shoulder, clearly not mollified in any way.

"Look, can you just put some clothes on?" Jim swept the throw rug off the couch and held it out, "or at least put this on."

"Is that your third wish?" Clearly Blair was going to hold onto this grudge as long as he possibly could.

For a moment Jim was tempted to agree, but that would mean not only losing his chance to make something meaningful of this opportunity, it would also mean losing Blair back into the lamp, and that was a prospect he wasn't ready to face yet. "No. It's just a suggestion."

"Huh." But Blair was suddenly clothed in the same outfit Jim had seen on him a few days back.

"I'm sorry, Chief. It's just that outfit... it's kinda distracting, and... and..." he mumbled into silence.

" _What_ did you say?" The change from sulkiness to sparkling amusement was startling, even after nearly a week of exposure to Blair's mercurial nature.

"I said it's _hot_. Can we move on?" Jim moved away, into the kitchen and poured himself a coffee from the pot that never seemed to empty or get cold. "It's not as if we can do anything about it."

"Oh, I don't know." Blair waited until Jim turned back to face him and then gave a sexy little wiggle and bounce. His hands fluttered suggestively at groin level. "We just can't touch each _other_ , nobody said anything about..."

"Blair!" Oh, this was just great. Now Jim had another image to add to the growing gallery in his mind. Blair just grinned.

* * *

Maybe it was just that they'd finally got it out in the open, but after that, everything seemed to go almost unnaturally smoothly. Blair made a surprisingly good partner, and a damn fine room-mate; it was a pleasure to come home together and chill out on the couch in front of the TV, and as one week turned into two and then three, Jim's social life suffered dramatically, but he'd never been happier.

Okay, so there was still the attraction thing, but they both knew it couldn't go anywhere and so Jim put it out of his mind as best he could and enjoyed the rest. And it seemed Blair was enjoying his companionship too. He'd stopped asking Jim about that third wish, and Jim was being very careful with his words. If he was careful enough, this could go on for a very long time.

"I guess if you stayed for a long time, say twenty years, you wouldn't look any older."

Blair looked understandably startled. They'd been arguing half-heartedly over whether to watch a re-run of last Friday's Jag's game (which they already knew the results of) or a documentary about Ancient Egypt on the Discovery channel when Jim had dropped that little comment. He shrugged casually. "I guess not."

Jim turned on the couch to face him. "I wish you could always stay with me."

"It doesn't work like that, Jim." Blair looked at him somberly. "You can't wish for more wishes, either."

"Damn. I was gonna try that next." Jim forced a smile to his face. "You can watch that Egyptian thing. I'm going to get some sleep." He ignored the sympathetic look on Blair's face. He must have been crazy to think that what he felt was reciprocated.

* * *

Jim's week started going downhill pretty comprehensively after that. The next day Rafe and Brown crashed a squad car chasing down a suspect and ended up in hospital - Rafe with a broken leg and Brown with concussion and broken ribs. Which meant that their caseload got shared around an already overburdened division.

Two days after that, Jim succumbed to the most vicious head cold he could ever remember suffering. It was so bad he even thought of expending his last wish on getting rid of it. He just wasn't quite ready to lose Blair yet.

Of course, given that they were already two men down, Jim went back to work after only one day off and spent the day hacking and coughing and blowing his nose until it felt raw. All he got for his efforts were sour looks from his fellow officers and semi-serious threats about the revenge that would be exacted if he managed to pass his germs on to anyone else.

Just as he thought things couldn't get any worse, they did.

Since Jim had been expecting to spend that day in court, Blair had stayed at home, no doubt happily surfing the net for more porn and flipping channels on the TV. He looked up from the couch as Jim stumbled in and dropped into the armchair closest to the door with a loud groan.

"Bad day, huh?" He'd already favoured Blair with his opinions on the court system, and the Genie had obviously taken them to heart.

Jim leaned his head back and closed his eyes. "You could say that."

The TV fell silent and he caught the whiff of sandalwood as Blair came over. Then a set of strong fingers began to massage his temples. His eyes flew open. Since when could Blair touch him? But Blair was sitting cross-legged on the rug in front of him. Jim decided he didn't want to know how it was done and closed his eyes again.

It had been a very bad day. Damnit, he _knew_ the guy was guilty, but he just hadn't managed to gather enough evidence to convince the jury that a nice, handsome, smart, _rich_ , young man like Bart Roberson got his kicks from beating prostitutes to death in sleazy hotels down by the wharves. The case had been thrown out, and more women were going to die before Jim managed to get the evidence he needed.

His life sucked. He was in love with a Genie, for God's sake. How much more pathetic could he get? It was time, Jim decided, to face reality. Use the last wish for something that would make his life worthwhile, and learn to live without Blair. He sighed, opened his eyes, and sat up straight in the chair.

Blair's eyes met his, somehow knowing, Jim was sure, what he was about to do.

"Blair... I wish..." Jim cleared his throat, giving the Genie - or himself - just a little more time. "I wish I could be a better cop."

A smile trembled on the full lips and Blair nodded. "Granted."

He was alone in the loft. Even the lamp had disappeared from its place on the coffee table. Jim sighed.

* * *

The coffee pot was cold, and the coffee smelt bitter. Jim poured it out and started making a fresh pot before trudging to the bathroom to take a shower which no longer smelled faintly of anything except chlorine and ran out of hot water far too soon. The towels felt scratchy.

It occurred to him, through the misery, that he didn't feel any different; but then how would being a better cop make him feel anyway? He'd just have to wait and find out. His head was aching, so he took a couple of aspirins and went to bed early.

Things only got worse from there. He woke during the night, from nightmares of being burned alive, to find that his skin felt like it really was on fire. Another shower didn't help, but just as he was wondering if he'd been exposed to something, or was having an allergic reaction, the burning, tingling sensation faded and he fell back into a restless doze.

The alarm woke him too early, and Jim staggered downstairs and managed to gulp down a mug of scalding hot coffee and chew his way through half a bagel before his stomach rebelled. Maybe it was the flu and not an allergy. Great way to start his first day of being a better cop...

When he got to the stationhouse, it was more of the same. The noise level drove him crazy, even though it really wasn't any worse than usual, and another couple of aspirins did no good at all. The mustard and ketchup on the hotdog he tried to eat for lunch made him choke. The whiff of a severely unwashed street-person passing him in the hallway left him gagging and trying not to bring up what little food had made it as far as his stomach in the last twenty-four hours.

By mid-afternoon his blood pressure must have been through the roof and nobody was willing to come closer than five feet from his desk. Simon appeared in the doorway to his office, glared at him, and jerked his thumb back over his shoulder. Jim rose reluctantly from his desk. So much for being a better cop.

"What is it, sir?" Jim hovered just inside the doorway, hoping for a quick escape. His head felt like it was about to explode and he didn't think he'd survive if Simon started smoking one of those cigars.

"Close the door." The words were tight with anger, but Simon waited until Jim had obeyed his order and dropped into a chair before continuing. "Now how about you tell me what the _hell is wrong with you, Ellison_!"

"I wish I knew, sir." Jim rubbed his forehead wearily. "All day my senses have been going haywire. Maybe I'm coming down with some bug, but..." his voice trailed off as his eyes were trapped by the light shining off the small silver box sitting on Simon's desk.

"...Jim! Damnit, snap out of it!" Simon's irritated voice cut through the blankness that had held Jim captive for... how long? He had no idea. Simon was looking extremely pissed and even more worried. "Look, you'd better take the rest of the afternoon off. Go to the hospital and get yourself checked out."

"But, Simon, we're already short..."

"And we'll be even more short staffed if you get yourself killed." Simon fixed him with a stern glare. "Do I have to make it an order?"

Jim sighed. "No, sir."

* * *

He wasn't exactly unknown at Cascade General, but they were more used to treating him for cuts, bruises and gunshot wounds than for nebulous complaints with unreliable symptoms. After an hour of being poked, prodded, measured, pricked and probed, Jim was more than happy to wait in the examining room for a doctor to come tell him his fate. Even a brain tumour, at this point, would be preferable to not knowing anything.

The door opened and Blair walked in. Sure, he looked a little different in a white lab coat with his hair tied back in a ponytail, but there was no doubting who he was. He even had the wire-rimmed glasses Jim had seen on him before.

"Detective Ellison? I'm Doctor McKay." Blair glanced down at his clipboard for a moment.

Jim thought his heart might suddenly pound its way out of his chest. "Blair, what the hell are you doing here?"

"I'm afraid you're mistaken. My name is..." Blair lost his way then, looking down at the clipboard in apparent confusion. "Look, there's nothing wrong with you, okay?"

He was lying. Jim could tell by the sudden spike in Blair's heartbeat and the sweat sheening his upper lip. It didn't even occur to him that he shouldn't be able to hear someone's heartbeat across a distance of several feet. Jim took a step forward, then another, and grabbed hold of Blair's arm. It felt solid under his fingers, and there was no weird tingling sensation. There was also no painful itching on his skin, no headache from the antiseptic smells of the hospital and the light didn't hurt his eyes any more.

"What the hell have you done to me? I wanted to be a better cop, but you... I can't even _work_ like this." He thrust his face well into Blair's personal space and all but snarled at the startled Genie.

Except that it was perfectly obvious that _this_ Blair was an all too real man. A man who smelt of fear and arousal and... and sandalwood.

"Okay, okay... I understand that you're upset, but I can help you." Blair licked his lower lip and glanced around the room as if someone or something might appear out of the walls. "I have this office. At the university. How about we go there and I explain everything?"

* * *

Blair Sandburg. That was the name on the door. Jim felt smug satisfaction, laced with a generous dose of confusion. Somehow he'd get to the bottom of this and then Blair had better watch out. Meanwhile, he listened to the not-Genie's fast-paced spiel with what patience he could muster.

"...so you see, these Sentinels ..." Blair gestured with the hand holding the book and nearly dropped it. He was definitely off his stride. The other Blair would have talked rings around him.

"Yeah, I get all that, but how is this gonna make me a better cop?" Jim shifted impatiently in his chair. "That's what I wished for and you have to grant me three wishes. So, as far as I'm concerned you still owe me a wish."

"Jim, for the last time, I am _not_ a..."

Jim simply stared meaningfully at the lamp sitting in plain sight on Sandburg's desk.

"Oh, all _right_!" Blair dropped into the chair behind the desk and leaned forward, holding his head in his hands. He'd released his hair from the ponytail when they'd arrived and now the long curls fell around his face like a curtain. "Okay, just supposing... for the sake of argument, okay? I'm not admitting to anything here."

Jim shrugged. "Fine by me."

"Well, there are some myths that are common to many cultures around the world, right?" Blair waited for Jim's grunt of agreement. "Well, most of these myths are believed to have some substance. Like Noah's Flood being a localised event instead of covering the whole world. Or the fact that Heinrich Schliemann discovered Troy by treating the information in the Iliad as though it was historically accurate."

"Go on."

"So, most myths have an internal consistency." Blair looked up at last and caught the look of total incomprehension on Jim's face. "They have _rules_ , Jim. Like, there's always three wishes; not two, not four. Three. Like, you can't wish for certain things."

"Oh." He thought he might even understand that.

"Yes, 'oh'. So if this _hypothetical_ Genie wanted to break one of those rules, well, then he'd have to be... creative... with the way he granted your wish." Blair looked at him expectantly.

Jim groaned in frustration. "But you... he... he hasn't... This Sentinel thing... how is it going to make me a better cop? I can't even get through the paperwork, the way things are now."

"Think about it, Jim. You're a walking crime lab. You can use those abilities at the scene of a crime, give yourself an incredible edge." Blair smiled brilliantly. "You're a monster, man! A throwback to precivilised..."

Blair squawked as Jim grabbed his shirtfront and hoisted him up so he was at Jim's eye-level. "Enough with the insults, okay? How am I going to use this? My senses are out of control."

It didn't seem to faze Blair that his feet were now dangling several inches off the floor. Jim felt a strong pair of thighs wrap around his hips and Blair's hands clamped firmly about his neck. "That's where I come in."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." Blair smiled and rocked his hips a little so Jim could feel the erection bulking out the front of his jeans. "Every Sentinel has a Guide. And since I'm just possibly the only person on the face of the planet who knows anything about Sentinels, you _need_ me to be a better cop."

So that's how he'd finagled it. He'd made himself an essential part of granting Jim's wish. He leaned in; rubbed his face against Blair's cheek and breathed deeply. "You know, you're _good_."

"Oh yeah..." Blair chuckled sexily. "And I can be better. How about you put me down and we go back to your place?"

That seemed like a good idea. Jim loosened the hold he had around Blair's chest and Blair unwrapped his legs from Jim's hips. They kissed for a long moment, then Blair turned towards the door. "You know, I have some very specific ideas on how we can proceed here."

"So do I, Chief." Jim pushed into Blair from behind as he stopped to open the door, letting him feel his own not inconsiderable hard-on. He smiled in anticipation. "So do I."


End file.
